A number of companies are being recognized for their efforts toward reaching gender parity; 230 to be exact.
Announced last week, the 2019 Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index has doubled in size from 2018 to include 230 companies devoted to advancing women in the workplace and transparency in gender reporting. Bloomberg provides companies with a standardized questionnaire designed to reflect how well they promote gender equality across the following four categories: internal employment and management statistics, internal policies supporting a gender-equal workplace, public support for women in the community and product offerings supporting women.
To participate in the survey, companies must meet a few criteria including public status and a current market cap of $1 billion or greater. For this year’s report, information reflects the 2017 fiscal year.
Once the 67-question survey is reviewed for each company, their results are scored against an established threshold. If a company exceeds that threshold, they’ve made it onto the Index.
“Greater transparency around workplace inclusion helps firms demonstrate accountability to their employees, investors and communities,” said Peter T. Grauer, chairman of Bloomberg. “Bloomberg’s standardized gender reporting framework serves as an underlying tool to guide disclosure, allowing companies to measure and manage gender equality across all their operations and businesses. It also provides these leading organizations an opportunity to inspire each other and develop best practices.”
While there’s certainly room for improvement, the Index reveals some promising advancements for women. For example, 43 percent of all promotions in 2017 were awarded to women, 68 percent of companies evaluate advertising and marketing content for gender biases before publication and 39 percent of companies acted to resolve pay disparities in FY 2017.
“As the investment community places greater value on gender equality, the Bloomberg GEI identifies the companies that excel at driving inclusion,” says Kiersten Barnet, manager of the Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index. “We are encouraged by the growth of the index within the past year, which demonstrates that across the world, more organizations are prioritizing transparency and equality in the workplace.”
Some of the companies that made the cut are listed in alphabetical order below:
- Accenture
- ADP
- Aetna, Inc.
- Allianz
- Cisco
- Robert Half
- SAP
- Voya Financial, Inc.
- Walmart
- Willis Towers Watson
A listing of all 230 companies can be found here.
